Aikido is a rough diamond at the moment. Many instructors don't understand the different parts of the art or how they fit together.
They also don't understand the cultural back ground that Aikido comes from i.e. ikken hisatsu, one strike decides all. Or maybe they just don't like it because it doesn't fit in with the whole pacifism thing people equate Aikido to.
There also needs to be an acknowledgement that the attacking side of the art is as important, if not more important than the defencive part and not just something we do so that we can practice technique.

Very insightful post.

One of the things I was trying to grasp is that out there, against untrained fighters or non-Japanese arts, not all of them are going to do that one strike decides all. Aikido developed in that environment and it is understandable that the techniques are devised as such.

However Aikido is still applicable in those scenarios if practiced and all I was hoping was that Aikido dojos also trained in dealing with these sorts of attacks by just maintaining ma-ai and quick non-committal redirections. A non-committal attack can be redirected easily and what often confuses students is that they try to apply a full technique that will only work against a ikken hisatsu sort of attack.

This is very much still Aikido but an aspect I feel that has been downplayed and options and focus should be given in this area. This would very much address many of the concerns and criticisms people have of Aikido (some of them which have some truth to it).